As our patron saint of liminality, Gloria E. Anzaldua writes above:“

…descend into Mictlán, the underworld.” 

This winter, we ground ourselves. We lay in our beds. We sit by the hearth. We sleep.

When is the last time you let your feet sink into Mama Tierra?  Have you let the dark womb of the Earth envelope you, surround you, love you? It’s time. Now is the time.

Coatlicue  –  symbol of Earth as both creator and destroyer – calls us to do the work we know we must do. Some call this shadowork. The journey of learning to love the marginalized parts of yourself. Our darkness. Our dark womb. We. Are. Dark. We must learn to lean into the gifts of the spirit world, to trust, to hibernate, and to rest in this dark, dark, love. 

Here’s what we are leaning into this season. Why don’t you join us?  

• Are you ready to journey into mictlán/the underworld and love your shadow, those parts of yourselves that we silence and that need the most healing and love? 
• What do you need to love your shadow?
• What is Coatlicue saying to you? 
• How does she communicate with you?
• What practices do you have in your pocket to help you, as Anzaldua writes, “reach bottom”?

It is time to celebrate death and let our feet “reach bottom,” as Anzaldua writes.  We do this so that we may ascend again and come face to face with the Diosa with a serpent skirt and a necklace of our heart/s. Lista? The writers this month are.  We are. Somos. We are.

Winter Prayer to Saint Lunita

By Ana Linda Arellano Nez

Abuelita’s songs of loss and solitude
bathe her in ceremonial sound
marigolds tremble nearby

Mama’s fiery prayers for deliverance
vibrate from her heart center
onto her children’s skin

My sharpened pencil picks colonial locks
out flutters truth in sparkling flames
ancestor’s ashes rest